Ruth K

This sounded like a good premise for a book. Nadia is a devoted mother of two small girls and loyal wife who is also a contract killer of what she believes are 'bad' people. Or at least that, and the fact that she's a psychopath (and everybody agrees she's a little different), is her justification. And then she's contracted to kill her own husband and is unable to do so until she establishes why he deserves it.

The author takes much too long with Nadia's indecisiveness and the story began to drag for me. Once I put it down, I was disinclined to pick it back up. I found the characters to be very superficial. Nadia is a hired assassin with just enough conscience to love her husband and children. Her husband is a ' management consultant' who frequently takes last minute work trips that she never questions in 10 years of marriage. I'm fairly sure that a hit man, or woman in this case, would have sharper powers of deduction in everyday life to have noted something amiss. And her husband never notices anything slightly 'off' about his wife in all that time either? Nor do two small children ever discover her hideaway closet with all the tools of her trade in playing around the house. This and all the other situational conveniences in the story left me a little underwhelmed. The ending was a huge disappointment as it obviously left room for at least one sequel and possibly a series. It's a mildly fun read if you're for mindless entertainment.

Readers of light mysteries and beach reads will enjoy this book. If you prefer something with more substance and believability, move on.

This is a very light read that I finished in one sitting. The writing is well paced enough to keep you interested, but the characters came across as little flat to me. There's no one I had any strong feelings about. Even though the central characters were early to late 20's, they behaved more like teenagers. The ending was somewhat of a dramatic stretch, but it all ends happily. It was a fun read nonetheless.

It took me awhile to get into this book. Initially, I didn't find the characters to be very interesting and was a little sceptical that four such different people could befriend each other solely on the basis of their insomnia. But as I kept reading, I became more involved in unraveling the mystery. I did find Sylvia's obsession with Betty's secret a tad overdramatic and her relationship with Zeke somewhat cheesy. And I never really understood exactly what part Julian played in the book. An ex FBI agent investigating a closed case and then taking on the role of protector for Betty made the plot much murkier than it needed to be. Overall though, I enjoyed the read as long as I could accept it for what it is-a light, entertaining mystery.

I loved this book. It was a difficult read at times, but I couldn't put it down. I initially thought in the first few chapters that Ms. Chung was going to give me another wartime love story. Thankfully this was not the case, because I feel that there wasn't a place for that in this particular story. I wasn't very familiar with the Korean War and had to do a little research to put the political climate of that time in context. The descriptive writing really made me feel like I was there and living Emma's experience. I appreciated the author's ability to offer an unbiased view of the events. None of the parties ever win in a war and we are quick to villify the enemy.

"People everywhere are the same," I finally said, channeling my friend Machiko. "Regardless of their nationality, they can be kind, and they can be cruel. The world has many selfish leaders, stupid leaders, and terrifying leaders, but it is largely filled with people who want to be good. It doesn't matter where you are in this life. Just pick somewhere where you can live and do good— where your nation does not depend on the ambition and whims of a single man, where you can change your leaders when they fail you."

I am recommending this book to everyone. It covers a time in history mostly forgotten and yet very relevant, particularly with what's happening in the world right now. It will stay with you a long time.

I kept nodding off through the first half of this book and almost gave up trying to read it. To describe it as slow moving, is an under statement. Every noun has an adjective and every verb an adverb. It's exhausting and much too wordy. I felt like I had started watching a movie from the middle. It very much needed a backstory to explain a period in history that I'm sure very few people, including myself, are familiar with. Once the semblance of a plot emerged, it became a somewhat more interesting read, but I never connected with it and basically feel that it was a wasted read.

I don't really know how to classify this book. I really enjoyed reading it and at the same time didn't always understand what was going on. It tells the stories of Opal Doucet and Nona Dixon in the timelines of Halley's comet in 1910 and 1986 respectively. Both are employees of The Earthshine Soap Company which in the 1986 scenario, is being accused of harmful ingredients in their products. The nonogenarian Bertie Tuttle, plays a role in both storylines as the owner of Earthshine. When Nona begins to dig into the company's history, she comes across the name of Opal Doucet and a fire that destroyed the company at the same time Halley's comet occurred in 1910.

Much of it confused me because I didn't feel like the author gave me enough background information on some of the characters. Opal claims to be a spiritualist and has "Comet pills" that she distributes to her coworkers to relieve their problems. She has escaped her husband, a physician who has treated her for some unspecified mental illness, when she discovered that she's pregnant. We never really know if she indeed is suffering an illness or has been made to think so. She grieves for Oren, a lost love, but we don't know anything about him. Nona is equally confusing. She has a good friend Halley, but we don't really get much information on her either, other than she lives a very erratic lifestyle and commits suicide and is the illegitimate daughter of Bertie's son, Charles.

There are just too many unexplained loose ends in the novel that I think the author could have explored a little more. My rating of four stars is based on the superb writing. Even when I was somewhat lost I could not stop reading because it was so involving.

This was cozy, fun read about a female Sri Lankan NYC taxi driver, Siri, who discovers that her fare has been murdered on the way to the airport. Of course the cops don't believe her and arrest her, whereupon she calls the only lawyer she knows, another Sri Lankan, a public defender in Manhattan. They both go on a search for the truth after bail is posted by Alex, a wealthy male friend from Siri's school days and apparently her only friend.

The plot moves fairly quickly, but has a lot of weak spots. For instance, what NYC public defender would have the time to personally go on a mission to prove her client's innocence? And neither of the women seem to get any sleep in the five days allotted to solve the crime. Then there are Siri's over protective immigrant parents, the death of her brother, the favored sibling in medical school (of course!) years earlier, and Siri having to drop out of law school due to her father's failing health and job loss, and you have some basis for her frustration for her dead end life.

I didn't connect with any of the characters and found the story to be a rather average mystery with nothing new to set it apart from others. It's obviously meant to be a book series, but not interesting enough that I'll be reading any sequels. It's a mindless read for those days when you have nothing else to do. Fun, quick, and easy.